In the early part of the twentieth century, the annual hiring fair, still held every February, was the opportunity for farm labourers to find work on the farms and estates around the town.

'You stood in the street - the three of us, the old man, my brother and me and the farmers came up and said, 'Are you for hiring?' They asked the age of the laddies and what you were capable of doing and how long he'd been in his previous situation.'

'Most farms had a 'kirn' every year. It was up to the men on the farm to have the 'kirn'. Most of those playing music were locals, you passed the hat round. They could play the 'melodeon' and some played the fiddle, all just learned by ear.'

By the mid twentieth century, the herring trade had all but disappeared, replaced by an increased effort in catching shellfish. The open yawls and drifters had given way to steam and then motor power. By the 1990s there were around sixteen fishing boats in Dunbar, fishing mainly for prawns, crabs and lobsters.

Brewing had been a local industry for hundreds of years. The Hunter family managed the company originally known as Dudgeon & Co from the original site at Monkscroft, Belhaven. In the 1970's, it became known as Belhaven Brewery Ltd.

'I started off drying mash for cattlefeed. Then I went from there to the boilers and shovelled twenty tons of coal per eight hour shift. The heat was tremendous. I lost anything up to 5lb in a shift!

The mills at West Barns, once the site of Annandale's paper mill, were taken over by British Malt Products. The familiar sight of the 100ft chimney disappeared with the rest of the buildings when they were demolished in the 1970's.

'Our wage was 33/- when we started. We were pieceworkers then and made good wages. We started at half past seven in the morning till half past five.'

In the post war years, Dunbar Town Council began trying to attract new industry to the town. In the mid 1950's, purpose built prefabricated huts at Winterfield housed Gibson & Lumgair Ltd, employing around thirty locals.